The Drowning Eyes by Foster Emily

Author:Foster, Emily [Foster, Emily]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Tom Doherty Associates
Published: 2016-01-12T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 5

Tazir longed to gulp the water down, to put the skin to her lips and suck it dry in two or three mighty swallows. Instead, she forced herself to take it in sip by conscientious sip. They were two days out from the nearest port, and they had less water than she liked to stock on the average day voyage.

And the kid still hadn’t woken up.

“We’re picking up a little speed,” said Chaqal as she sat down beside her. “The wind’s still strong on our fore.”

Tazir grunted as she corked her water skin again. If the wind coming in to Kuhon had been freakishly good, then the wind coming out was just as freakishly bad. The whole point of the Giggling Goat’s design was that she could trudge through pretty much any wind, but these swirling garbage breezes on the edge of a sudden magic storm—this was, to put it mildly, an interesting challenge.

“Come on,” her quartermaster said. “We made it out.”

“Yeah?” Tazir fought the urge to spit over the railing behind her. “Lot of good that does us now.”

“Look, we’ll be in Moliki in two days.” Chaqal rolled her eyes and stretched. “And we’ve stretched water thinner than this before.”

“That doesn’t mean I like doing it,” Tazir grumbled. “Besides, you don’t know what’s gonna happen between here and there.” She swept her arm in the general direction of Moliki. “We could get attacked or becalmed or blown half the way to fuckin’ Darjai by the time our wind wakes up again.”

“We’ll make it fine,” Chaqal said. “I think the storm’s pissed itself out.”

For the last day and a half, they’d had their eyes glued to the south, watching the storm that had begun as weird grey vomit. It billowed high above Kuhon, blocking the sun and whipping the water beneath it into a sheet of grey foam. The Giggling Goat was lucky to have escaped before it gathered its full strength—Tazir had weathered some nasty shit, but a black wall of a storm like that was enough to make even the hardest sailor hunker down in a bar somewhere.

Now, the storm had either moved south or grown smaller. It was still lined up right with Kuhon, which was now smoldering in the sunlight. Now and then, Tazir swore she could catch a whiff of wood smoke and charred flesh coming from the port.

“Is she awake?” asked Chaqal.

Tazir shook her head and pulled her pipe from her sash. “Moanin’ and cryin’ like she’s coming off some harsh dope,” she said. It was just as annoying as it had been on the way into Kuhon, but really now. What kind of rank sow was gonna complain about a girl, freaky and unnatural and severely misguided or not, who’d pulled that shit to save her?

“I can’t say I blame her,” Chaqal said. She frowned at the hatchway. “That’s—watching that happen—”

“And not for the first time, either.” Tazir shook her head and packed a fresh wad of tobacco into the pipe.

Chaqal opened her mouth to say something, then shut it and nodded.

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